Tag Archive for: C-Span

MSM Lies about Muslims Lying (Taqiyya) by Raymond Ibrahim

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Dr. Ben Carson’s recent assertion that the Islamic doctrine of taqiyya encourages Muslims “to lie to achieve your goals” has prompted the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler to quote a number of academics to show that the presidential candidate got it wrong:

The word “taqiyya” derives from the Arabic words for “piety” and “fear of God” and indicates when a person is in a state of caution, said Khaled Abou El Fadl, a professor of law at the University of California at Los Angeles and a leading authority on Islam.

[…]

“Yes, it is permissible to hide the fact you are Muslim” if a person is under threat, “as long as it does not involve hurting another person,” Abou El Fadl said.

The other academics whom Kessler quotes—including Omid Safi, director of the Duke University Islamic Studies Center, and Noah Feldman of Harvard Law School—make the same argument: yes, taqiyya is in the Koran but it only permits deception in the case of self-preservation, nothing more.

Not exactly.

Although the word taqiyya is related to the Arabic word “piety” and its root meaning is “protect” or “guard against”—and the Koran verses that advocate it (3:28 and 16:106) do so in the context of self-preservation from persecution—that is not the whole story.

None of the academics quoted by Kessler bothered to acknowledge that the Koran is not the only textual source to inform Muslim action.  They ignore the Hadith, the collected words and deeds of Muhammad.  Koran 33:2, for instance, commands Muslims to follow Muhammad’s example, and his example—also known as the prophet’s Sunna—is derived from the many volumes of Hadith.

The importance of Muhammad’s example is seen in that the Sunnis, approximately 90% of the world’s Muslim population, are named after his Sunna.  As one Muslim cleric puts it,  “Much of Islam will remain mere abstract concepts without Hadith [whence the Sunna is derived]. We would never know how to pray, fast, pay zakah, or make pilgrimage without the illustration found in Hadith…”

It is therefore careless or disingenuous for Kessler and his “experts” to ignore Muhammad’s example as recorded in the Hadith in their discussion of taqiyya.

As usual, for the complete truth, one must turn to scholarly books written in Arabic. According to Dr. Sami Mukaram, an Islamic studies professor specializing in taqiyya, and author of the only academic book exclusively devoted to it, “Taqiyya in order to deceive the enemy is permissible.”

This sounds similar to Carson’s assertion that taqiyya allows Muslims  “to lie to achieve your goals.”

As proof, Mukaram documents two canonical anecdotes from Muhammad’s Sunna—his example to Muslims—that make clear that the prophet allowed his followers to lie and deceive non-Muslims above and beyond the issue of self-preservation… Keep reading

Now 30,000 foreign Muslims have joined ISIS; analyst says they’ve lost momentum

The Narrowness of the C-Span

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C-Span’s mission for the past 35 years has allegedly been to make government more open to the American public, providing 8,000 hours of programming to 100 million American homes. While C-Span is committed to carrying Congressional proceedings in their entirety, sans editing, and claims no filtering to distort viewpoints, it abandons these lofty ideals of impartiality, honesty, and fair-mindedness on other occasions. The daily, three-hour talk show, Washington Journal (WJ), is a hate-fest that welcomes callers with their non-stop barrage of abuses and invectives directed solely at Jews and Israel, with no other creed, ethnicity or nation on the planet so vilified. In complete compliance with the indoctrinal hate speech of Islamism and Fascism, the hosts routinely encourage callers’ bigotry and propaganda, without interruption or correction, while averting negative comments about other groups.

One such caller attempted a comparison of drawing cartoons of the prophet Mohammed with the age-old demonization that Jews killed Jesus, calling the latter an “historical fact.” History and the Christian Scriptures unequivocally confirm that Jesus died at the hands of the Roman rulers of Judea, by the Roman method of crucifixion, and that, in fact, the followers of Jesus were Jews. Further, Pope Paul VI rejected the collective guilt accusation in 1965, and Pope Benedict XVI asserted there is nothing in Scripture that would place the culpability on the Jewish people. Yet, C-Span’s host maintained silence, thereby lending credibility to the caller’s renewed ancient accusation of deicide against the Jewish people.

Many rotating WJ moderators, such as Peter Slen, accept rambling anti-Semitic calls that derogatorily claim U.S. Congressmen have dual citizenship with Israel; that blame Jews for America’s entry into the Middle East, for the destruction of the World Trade Center, for being “too white” to belong in Israel, for the US’s failing banking system and Federal Reserve, for causing wars around the world, for manipulating the world’s oil supply, for dropping white phosphorus (which is neither a chemical weapon nor weapon at all), and all manner of conspiratorial accusations and defamation. C-Span also provided full program time for Medea Benjamin, a radical, left-wing activist for Code Pink, a self-described peace and social justice movement that promotes BDS (boycott-divestment-sanctions) against Israel.

While these are certainly issues that should be addressed by the C-Span because they are malicious, deceptive and libelous, C-Span’s conspiratorial silence aids in nourishing the public with false information, jihadi lies that can ultimately endanger the lives of all Israeli and American citizens. The arrangement allows the under-informed and the misinformed to remain biased, to be incapable of discerning friend from foe, to be more compliant in accepting the end of our Constitutional liberties and having them replaced with Marxist principles now being taught in our schools. Demonizing and delegitimizing Jews, Judaism and Israel brings us one step closer to vilifying Christianity and America, and putting Americans under Marxist or Islamic law.

Israel is a land of incredible diversity, an open society with consistent attention to democracy for all religions and ethnicities. Israel’s work ethic, a commitment that dates back to the Biblical Jacob and Joseph, is the driving force behind the country’s astonishing progress and contributions to other nations. The only stable, reliable expert and unconditional ally of the U.S., Israel is always at the ready, acting as America’s beachhead and “America’s largest aircraft carrier,” supplying us with more intelligence than all NATO countries combined – an effective ally against jihad, providing homeland security training for US airport security and police departments; counter-intelligence training, and defense against cyberspace sabotage.

Israel shares her knowledge and equipment in technology and security with the U.S. and countless innovations and inventions with mankind – including recent eye sight restoration for 90 patients in Kyrgystan; water expertise with U.S. cities and 131 Indian villages; greenhouse technology for the Philippines; successful treatment for Alzheimer’s; new lung cancer tests; a device to treat Peripheral Artery Disease, and Israel’s ExAblate system that provides pain management from bone metastases. Israel is also among the first responders to bio-terrorism and natural disasters worldwide, with hospitals, experienced staff, and equipment; Boston, MA General Hospital (Boston Marathon Bombers) received its training from Israel Disaster First Responders. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is a source of relief for people throughout the world, and oversees the daily delivery of 20,000 tons of food brought in 600+ trucks into Gaza. In short, Israel is dedicated to helping the world with her medical and technological innovations, yet we hear nothing of this vital information discussed on C-Span.

In contrast, there is no diversity in Islamic countries. Where there may still be pockets of Christian Yazidis, more than 3,000 have been kidnapped for sexual slavery, conversion, or slaughter. We have evidence of the ever-increasing brutality perpetrated by the Islamic State; the thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of women currently held in sexual bondage; and the complete destruction of historical evidence of the conquered culture. Islam is dedicated to governing new infidels under Sharia law, inventing new means of torture and death, and designing new prohibitions for women.  Does C-Span ever expose the brutality of ISIS and other jihadi organizations to their audience?

The Palestinian Authority honors and embraces terrorists who murder Israeli children, their rewards as much as four times the average civil servant’s salary. Schools, summer camps, sporting events, and town squares are named to venerate murderers. In May, 2013, the official PA TV honored Palestinian terrorists responsible for the death of 156 Israeli civilians. Photos of the butchered victims in pools of blood are posted on Facebook as “heroic operations,” and seen as fulfilling Islam. Muslims derive their identity and raison d’etre from Koranic literature, central to which is the death and destruction of those who will not accept Islam’s religion and Sharia laws.  These unpalatable facts remain unaddressed by C-Span.

Interestingly, Canadian Jew, Steve Maman, inspired by Oskar Schindler, formed the nonprofit Liberation of Christian and Yazidi Children of Iraq (CYCI), dedicated to freeing those captured by terrorists for sexual slavery by ISIS. We are our brother’s keeper. We are all responsible for our survival and our country, and C-Span’s role in this should be to provide its listeners with the plain truths about both Islam and Israel.

Kerry’s Double-talk on Iran

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On Tuesday, June 16, 2015, Secretary of State John Kerry held a video conference with a number of news media journalists on prevailing issues. Less than fourteen days remain till a definitive Joint Plan of Action might be available for Congress review under the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act (INARA). That is, if there isn’t a delay.This video conference revealed still yet another stunning concession on the critical element of Iran’s previous military developments (PMD): perfect knowledge of all prior nuclear developments making IAEA verification virtually impossible. Kerry was backtracking on his November 2013 and April 2, 2015 statements.

Watch the State Department video conference with Secretary Kerry:

Witness this exchange with Michael Gordon of the New York Times:

QUESTION: Sir, I’m Michael Gordon, New York Times. You mentioned that possible military dimensions, which is the term of art for suspected nuclear design work and testing of nuclear components, has to be addressed as part of a prospective Iran agreement. Do these concerns need to be fully resolved before sanctions are eased or released or removed or suspended on Iran as part of that agreement? Is that a core principle or is that also negotiable? Thank you.

SECRETARY KERRY: Michael, the possible military dimensions, frankly, gets distorted a little bit in some of the discussion, in that we’re not fixated on Iran specifically accounting for what they did at one point in time or another. We know what they did. We have no doubt. We have absolute knowledge with respect to the certain military activities they were engaged in.

What we’re concerned about is going forward. It’s critical to us to know that going forward, those activities have been stopped, and that we can account for that in a legitimate way. That clearly is one of the requirements in our judgment for what has to be achieved in order to have a legitimate agreement. And in order to have an agreement to trigger any kind of material significant sanctions relief, we would have to have those answers.

Armin Rosen, writing in Business Insider considered Kerry’s answer contradictory to what the Secretary had said back in April:

This is a crucial question. Without Iran divulging the degree of its past work on nuclear weaponization, inspectors will have a harder time establishing a baseline for assessing Iranian compliance with the terms of a deal.

Disclosure on the nuclear program’s military dimensions is also an early yardstick of Iranian good faith.

The International Atomic Energy Agency submitted 12 queries to Iran about its weaponization work in 2011. Tehran had only responded to one of them as of February 2013, and the IAEA’s leadership has acknowledged that it doesn’t think Iran will come clean before the June 30 deadline.

That makes some sense from Iran’s perspective, as the country’s negotiators have deftly used the ambiguities surrounding the country’s weaponization work for negotiating leverage. But that rationale disappears once a deal is signed, at which point the sides will have spent whatever leverage they had while theoretically having a mutual incentive to make the agreement work. And it won’t work as well if inspectors don’t have an understanding of the full extent and history of Iran’s nuclear program.

Here’s why Rosen thought Kerry’s answer contradictory and problematic in understanding how a definitive JPOA was verifiable:

Kerry’s answer is puzzling for a number of other reasons. The administration’s assessment of the nuclear dimensions of Iran’s program is not just secret, but non-disprovable for anyone who hasn’t seen US or allied intelligence on Iranian weaponization.

Kerry’s answer doesn’t mesh with repeated IAEA claims that the Agency can’t verify “that all the activities in Iran are for peaceful purposes.”

And Kerry doesn’t elaborate about “what they did.” Was Iran testing nuclear detonators, or diverting fissile material to a weapons program? Is the extent of Iranian weaponization work greater or less than the public record — which establishes that Iran may have tested nuclear weapons triggers at the Parchin facility up until 2003, andmaintained a research group dedicated to weaponization activities?

Kerry’s statement raises more questions than it answers. But it appears that the Obama administration isn’t going to insist on full Iranian disclosure of the extent of its nuclear program as part of a comprehensive deal.

Here’s why:

That’s a shift from just two months ago; right after the parties reached a preliminary deal, when Kerry told PBS that Iran would need to divulge its past nuclear activities as part of any final deal.

“They have to do it. It will be done. If there’s going to be a deal; it will be done,” he said.

Whether it is collaborative research with North Korea on nuclear warheads or ICBM technology or another country in the axis of resistance, Iran will not permit any verification of prior military developments by the IAEA through inspection of the known military sites in country.  Going forward on that basis is impractical and unsafe.  Iran doubtless may already have achieved nuclear weapons capabilities.   Moreover upon lifting upwards of $50 billion in sanctioned funds, Iran may accelerate the means of delivering them, as well as, funding more chaos in neighboring Afghanistan and Iraq.  The days are running down towards a debacle with an untrustworthy Iran, increasing the unease of Congress on the cusp of reviewing it under the INARA.  A negative vote which may trigger a veto by President Obama that the Congress may not have the votes to override.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.